Per the website linked, asylees and refugees do not come under the export control act, as opposed to citizens of other nations. The timing of the lawsuit does seem interesting though.
A “foreign person” is defined in ITAR (22 CFR Sec. 120.63), by reference to two sections of immigration law in Title 8 of the US Code, as someone who is none of the following: a US citizen, a lawful permanent resident, an asylee or refugee, a person lawfully admitted for permanent residency (I haven’t done the analysis to see if this is distinct from “lawful permanent resident” or if its overlap with different language between the categories referenced from different parts of Title 8 of the US Code), a person lawfully admitted for certain classes of temporary residency.
Regardless, the ITAR issue is secondary; they hire for roles that do not touch ITAR.
I dunno, if the people they are discriminating against are “US persons” and not “foreign persons” under ITAR, then the whole ITAR argument for discrimination, whether its direct coverage or some kind of indirect risk creating something that Tesla wants to try to argue is a bona fide occupational qualification justifying discrimination, is cut off at the root.
If the refugee has a new citizenship in their host nation, then in what sense are they still a refugee?
I thought gp was alluding to something within the last few days.